What's at stake?
Northeast Fresno county residents will get an opportunity to elect their supervisor between two choices in the upcoming March primary election — incumbent Nathan Magsig and challenger Jennifer Cruz.
Jennifer Cruz, a political newcomer, is taking on Nathan Magsig, a veteran political incumbent, in the race for the Fresno County Board of Supervisors, District 5 seat.
What’s at stake?
Magsig currently serves as the chairman of the Fresno County Board of Supervisors. He first was elected in 2020, running unopposed.
The race marks Cruz’s debut into politics.
Fresno County Supervisor District 5 is located in eastern Fresno County, including Clovis and Fresno’s Easterby and Sunnyside neighborhoods.
The Sierra Nevada Mountains makes up most of the district’s jurisdiction. This includes places like Yokuts Valley, Millerton Lake, Friant Ranch, Patterson Mountains, the Sierra National Forest and Kings Canyon National Park.
The winner of the district would also hold key votes on new developments like Millerton and the Friant Ranch region.
At the county level, the candidates are setting their sights on public office at a time when homelessness, and particularly the number of unsheltered people, in the Fresno area is on the rise.
The Fresno-area also continues to struggle with an unemployment rate above the national average as well as a below-average median income.
On top of that, Fresno has some of the nation’s worst air quality.
What does the Fresno County Board of Supervisors do?
The Fresno County Board of Supervisors makes decisions on countywide services, including elections, voter registration, law enforcements, jails, vital records, tax collection, public health and social services. They also serve as the local government for all unincorporated areas.
Who is running for Fresno County Board of Supervisors, District 5?
Jennifer Cruz
Cruz has been working with the Fresno Economic Opportunities Commission since 2016 as a case manager in permanent supportive housing programs as well as an LGBTQ+ resource manager.
Cruz received her bachelor’s degree in psychology from Fresno State and her master’s degree in Human Services from Purdue Global.
Cruz, a political newcomer, entered the race on Dec. 4, just four days before the filing deadline.
On affordable housing
Cruz expressed support for increased county involvement to bring more supportive housing, citing her own experience growing up in permanent supportive housing. She expressed empathy for young people not having the same advantage she had.
“If you do the math, anybody even making $20 an hour,” Cruz said. “If the average rent is at $1,600 a month, once you’ve paid your taxes and probably health insurance, people can’t afford it.”
Cruz acknowledged her lack of political experience means she may not currently have all the answers. She leans on her experience in community events as a way of their needs. She does believe however, that she can identify basic spots the county can improve toward housing.
“To be fair, I am not a politician,” Cruz said.” This all came as a result of me sitting in advocacy spots over 2023.”
“I don’t know what the policy is, but I have a proven record of going into a place where I don’t know much about what’s happening, learning the things that I need to learn, and then collaborating and partnering and making things successful,” Cruz added.
On labor and the economy
Cruz said that she would be a supervisor who supports labor and unions.
Drawing focus to the ongoing protests by SEIU 2015 to get increased wages, Cruz said she supports the union’s requests, calling the board’s current raise proposal “basically ridiculous.”
Cruz said she sympathizes with SEIU 2015, which she said reminds her of her own family of “primarily older women of color.” She also sees the group as a reflection of the economic struggles many people in her life go through.
“I have friends and people in my life that are working 40 hours a week and still have to move in with family because they can’t afford groceries,” Cruz said. “Are we all supposed to have two or three jobs to survive?”
Cruz said the county should be more proactive in finding solutions. Continuing to draw on her past work experience, Cruz believes that she can find a way to satisfy both the board and its constituents.
“It’s my job to be creative, find solutions and do things to help people,” Cruz said.” I care about people, I’ve been proving it for decades.”
On climate and the environment
Cruz said her “biggest grievance” with the county’s handling of environmental issues came in 2022 when the Board of Supervisors turned down funding to study local climate change impacts.
“If we’re not going to do those environmental studies, if we’re going to stay purposefully in the dark about it, we’re gonna have more issues,” Cruz said.
Cruz said local farmers may dissuade the board from supporting similar studies, but still believes that she can find a solution to satisfy both parties.
“There are ways that we can take free money from the state to do environmental studies, and then still make sure that AG is happy,” Cruz said. “We can find a way to know about the environmental issues and also support agriculture, because we have to. I know that if it was me, I would find a creative way to not just ignore the environmental stuff or reject an environmental study.”
On what motivated her to start her political career
Cruz said that she didn’t always see herself as a politician.
“The absolute honest truth is I did not have political aspirations in this lifetime,” Cruz said. That’s the truth.”
“I solve problems. I’m good at what I do.”
Cruz attributes her adaptability in all of her previous jobs to her ability to identify the problems she needs to solve. She said her past experiences taught her how to solve problems..
“How can I improve myself to serve the community,” Cruz said. “As far as Fresno County goes, there’s a lot of people here living in systems and in circumstances that are less than. They’re struggling, whether it’s with rent, food insecurity, the cost of childcare? Why can’t we solve these problems for people and help people thrive?”
Nathan Magsig
Magsig is the incumbent currently serving as the supervisor for District 5. He has been serving as supervisor since 2017, and last won an election for the role unopposed in 2020. He also currently serves as the president of the Yosemite Sequoia Research Conservation And Development Council and as a board member of the Fresno County Employee Retirement Association.
He served as a Clovis City Council member from 2001-2017, and as the city’s mayor twice from 2005 – 2007 and 2015 – 2017.
Magisg also served as the energy director/RME for the Fresno EOC from 2011-2017.
On affordable housing
Magsig cites his accomplishments as an appointed member with the retirement association, which holds a partnership with the Royal Bank of Canada, to use pension funds toward homeownership, affordable rental housing, and small business development in Fresno County.
“We opened this fund up and helped to create apartments and affordable housing units here in Fresno County,” Magsig said. “I’m not aware of any other elected official who has used pension funds to do something like that.”
Magsig says that, although certain costs for building a home cannot be changed through local government, the introduction of a lumber industry in Fresno County may help bring prices down.
Magsig says it’s important for Fresnans to have access to housing.
“Affordability is very important to me and homeownership is important,” Magsig said. “I’m one who believes that wealth can be created through homeownership.”
On climate and the environment
Magsig confirms his beliefs in climate change.
“The climate is absolutely changing, but what’s driving the climate to change?” Magsig said. “I think that still is up for discussion.”
However, he feels the overall cause of climate change is still up for debate. He also questions the way “policymakers” choose to fight against climate change.
“If they really wanted to get at the biggest contributor of greenhouse gas emissions; It’s not fossil fuels, it’s our forests,” Magsig said.
“There have been studies that have been done showing that…forest fires that happen not just in the United States, but all over the world, contribute more to the greenhouse gas effects than fossil fuel consumption,” Magsig added. “But a lot of our policymakers primarily want to focus on fossil fuels, or focus on the utility companies, and not focus on proper forest management. That’s where there’s a disconnect with me.”
A study published in 2023 led by the University of California, Irvine, found that “Carbon dioxide emissions from wildfires, which have been gradually increasing since 2000, spiked drastically to a record high in 2021.”
The researchers added that “the worsening fires are part of a climate-fire feedback in which carbon dioxide emissions warm the planet, creating conditions that lead to more fires and more emissions.”
Magsig said he plans to fight for better forest management.
“The health and condition of our forests not only reduces forest fires, but it lowers insurance rates for people who live in the forested areas, and our air quality improves to the extent that we can reduce or eliminate forest fires, as well as the number of trees that are dead and dying in our forests.”
The California Air Resources Board says “fire is a natural and critical ecological function for maintaining healthy and resilient forests, and supports several ecosystem functions such as facilitating germination of seeds, replenishing soil nutrients, stimulate tree growth, and reducing fuels.”
Magsig also said more oil drilling in California could help reduce greenhouse gas emissions. He has been on record saying that he believes the state should be drilling more oil.
“If people really want to lower greenhouse gas emissions, then we would be drilling here in California,” Magsig said. “Otherwise we are shipping oil from other countries on ships that burn fossil fuels to move those fossil fuels here. And then these oils are being refined at refineries that don’t have the same standards that we have here in California.
Magsig said he believes in hydroelectric and nuclear as renewable resources, but laments that they “are not recognized as eligible renewables under California’s RPS Program”
“To me, those laws need to change,” Magsig said. “Here in Fresno County, there still is tremendous opportunity to build more large-scale hydro, and I think there would be a double benefit of generating electricity and you’re able to store water, which helps disadvantaged communities right here in the Central Valley.”
On jobs and labor
Magsig takes pride in Fresno’s status in agriculture, with the industry bringing in $8 billion in revenue in 2021.
“Policies are not going to help us maintain that status, but what will is water,” Magsig said.
Magsis said he’s looking to repurpose the Dry Creek Basin flood control basin for “more sources of water available not only to cities but also to farmers. It allows them to be more productive with their crops.”
He said the agriculture industry’s success can be the cure for other county issues.
“Individuals who downplay the importance of ag, I think, really haven’t thought through the full impact of what it would look like if there was mass starvation in this world,” Magsig said. “Making sure that we produce as much as possible keeps food prices low. That helps low-income families right here in our own backyard because food prices go up like energy prices have gone up. It makes it difficult for people to live and that could be some of the things that are driving our homeless population.”
“But right now, it seems like there is a little bit of a war against agriculture and I don’t know why,” Magsig said. “The value of what’s produced goes far beyond just the United States because the food that’s grown in the Central Valley is consumed around the world.”
“When I say there’s a war on agriculture, it’s because agriculture is being put secondary or even tertiary to other interests,” Magsig added. “I’m one who believes that any decision that’s made by lawmakers, people need to be first and foremost, especially those that are in disadvantaged communities.”
Who is endorsing the candidates?
Jennifer Cruz
- Whitney Shananhan CA-48 Congress CAndidate
- Fresno Democratic Central Committee
- Planned Parenthood Advocates Mar Monte
- Biological Diversity Center Action Fund
- Stonewall Democrats
- San Joaquin Democrats
- LPAC
- Clovis Democrats
- Fresno County Democratic Women’s Club
- Central Valley Progressive PAC
- National Women’s Political Caucus
- Dem Women In Action
- Equality California
- California Faculty Association
- Victory Fund
Nathan Magsig
- Fresno Deputy Sheriff’s Association
- Fresno Police Officers Association
- Clovis Police Officers’ Association
- Fresno Building and Construction Trades Council
Who is funding the candidates?
Magsig has a significant fundraising advantage, with nearly $285,000 in contributions given since 2021, compared to Cruz’ $26,000.
Click on the interactive graphic below to explore more of the candidates’ contributions.
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